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Taking ‘Adventure Botany’ on the Road

Whether you await the arrival of “Shark Week” with feverish enthusiasm each year or simply look forward to greeting your Labradoodle when you return home at day’s end, it’s likely you subscribe to Christopher Martine ’06 Ph.D.’s belief that animals are, indeed, awesome.

Christopher Martine ’06 Ph.D., left, and Krissa Skogen ’08 Ph.D. collect a sample of pollen from the proboscis of a nocturnal hawkmoth at White Sands National Monument in New Mexico, while filming the latest episode of Martine’s web series, “Plants Are Cool, Too!” Both are alumni of UConn’s ecology and evolutionary biology graduate program. (Photo by Patrick Alexander)

But this UConn alum is out to prove to you that, in fact, plants are very cool, too.

Traveling to deserts, swamps, and mountain ranges across the country with a film crew in tow, Martine is on a mission to seek out unusual and extraordinary stories about the plant world and then to deliver them to audiences far and wide via his own YouTube web series – aptly titled “Plants Are Cool, Too!”

“There is all this dynamic visual content out there for young people to watch,” says Martine, creator, co-producer, and host for “Plants Are Cool, Too!” as well as associate professor of plant genetics and research at Bucknell University. “There’s ‘Shark Week’ and all these other animal shows, and it’s a great way for kids to learn about nature. I thought, ‘Well, what do people have for plants?’ There are a lot of gardening shows; no kid is going to watch a gardening show. So the idea here was to generate cool content related to botany, and hope that young people had something they could actually find and watch if they were willing to learn about plants.”

Join us for a talk by Gina Barreca,2018 UCONN BOARD OF TRUSTEESDISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH

All great works of fiction, poetry and dramaâas well as texts forming mythologies, religions, national epics to heroic sagasâhave loneliness at the heart of their narrative. From Persephone to Peter Pan, from âFrankensteinâ to âFrozen,â the stories we pass along are saturated with unwilling isolation.âOnly around half of Americans say they have meaningful, daily face-to-face social interactions,â according to a 2017 study. A former U.S. Surgeon General argues that âWe live in the most technologically connected age in the history of civilization, yet rates of loneliness have doubled since the 1980s.â We need more than social media. We need social contact. We need community. How can we break through the loneliness barrier? Being alone when in need of companionship is more than sad; itâs an epidemic.Chronic loneliness is as bad for your health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. We need to change our national story and, often, our personal ones as well.Even the concept of the âlone wolfâ is a myth. Wolves hunt in packs.

Reception to follow.

For more information about this event, or if you are an individual who requires special accommodation to participate, please contact the CLAS Deanâs Office at (860) 486-2713.

A liberal arts and sciences degree prepares students with the tools they need to excel across a wide range of careers. Given the number of options available to you, it can be overwhelming to narrow down career choices. Attending CLAS Career Night will provide you exposure to career opportunities for CLAS students.

This semesterâs focus will be on research-based careers. During this event you will engage with CLAS alumni, learn about various occupations, and gain insight about how to best prepare for your future career.

The McNair Scholars Program and the Office of Undergraduate Research invite you to join us for a brown bag research seminar.

Birds, Bacteria, and Bioinformatics: Why Evolutionary Biology is the Best

Sarah Hird, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Molecular and Cell Biology

This series is open to all undergraduate and graduate students, and is designed especially for students conducting (or interested in conducting) STEM research. These seminars are opportunities to learn about research being pursued around campus, to talk with faculty about their path into research, and to ask questions about getting involved in research.

About CLAS

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences is the academic core of learning and research at UConn. We are committed to the full spectrum of academics across the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. We give students a liberal arts and sciences education that empowers them with broad knowledge, transferable skills, and an ability to think critically about important issues across a variety of disciplines.